Former Beijing Airport Boss Executed in China

On Friday, the former head of the company that runs airports in Beijing and more than 30 other Chinese cities was put to death after the People’s Supreme Court upheld his sentence in a $16 million bribery and embezzlement case.

Li Peiying’s execution came two days after word emerged that the head of China’s nuclear power program was under investigation for alleged corruption. Just last month, the former chairman of China’s second-biggest oil company, Sinopec, was also convicted of taking $29 million in bribes and given a suspended death sentence.

The heads of state-owned enterprises “possess power and money, making it easy to give rise to corruption,” Wang Yukai of the China National School of Administration was quoted Friday in the Communist Party newspaper Global Times as saying.

China has long struggled against corruption among high-level Communist Party officials, hoping high-profile takedowns will help scare the rank and file straight.